Commentary

Commentary: Here’s Why You Need to Vote in the California Recall Election

We cannot afford to be complacent and watch like spectators as our rights are rolled back, our interests are ignored, and our power is discounted. This recall election will be a crucial test of our will as voters.

Published

3 years ago

August 25, 2021

Isabelle Price

Young woman voting from home. She is filling papers to send by mail for the upcoming presidential election.

On September 14, a special election will be held to determine whether Governor Gavin Newsom should be recalled. This is only the fourth time in American history – that a state has held a gubernatorial recall election.

The last gubernatorial recall election in California took place nearly 20 years ago.

This recall election was triggered after the Secretary of State certified that 1.7 million Californians signed a petition demanding a vote to remove Newsom from the office he assumed in January 2019.

Under state law, to initiate a recall, proponents need to collect the signatures of enough registered voters to equal 12% of the turnout in the prior governor’s race.

The recall ballots will ask two questions. The first is a simple yes-or-no question: should Newsom be recalled. If 50% or more of voters mark ‘NO’ then the effort to recall Newsom is defeated.

However, if more than 50% mark ‘YES’ then the second question comes into play: who should replace him? There are 46 names on the ballot, and the candidate with the most votes, as dictated by state law, will become governor for the remainder of Newsom’s term – which is through January 2023.

Whether or not you support Newsom, your vote in this election matters.

When we cast a vote, we win. We are represented. That’s the power that lies at the heart of the democratic process. It is the beauty of having free and fair elections.

Black Americans have a long history of struggling to exercise their right as citizens to vote. Those who came of age before 1965, less than 60 years ago, felt it all too keenly, particularly in the South, where they were systematically turned away from polling places.

Once they secured the vote, the idea of not even attempting to participate in an election would have been an abdication of their rights as Americans.

The people we entrust with our vote to lead us — whether it is at the federal, state, or local level – are responsible for developing policies and legislation that affect how safe we are in our homes and communities, our access to quality health care and education, the financial opportunities available to us, and more.

An outcome of the 2020 Presidential election cycle has been an extension of the unprecedented assault on voting rights beginning with the Supreme Court decision, Shelby v. Holder (2013), weakening the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and has led to more laws restricting our ability to vote.

California has taken extraordinary steps to remove barriers and increase access to the polls, setting the national standard for what free and fair elections should look like.

Sometimes it might feel like democracy happens election by election, step by step, once every two or even four years.

But democracy doesn’t work like that. It doesn’t take a day off. It’s a constant process, happening all the time, whether we choose to engage or not. It’s messy, ugly, hard work.

Not voting is just as much an act of democracy as is voting – refusing to participate is a choice.

Every registered voter will automatically receive a ballot. Vote by mail started Aug 16. The last day to register to vote is August 30.

However, you can “conditionally” register and vote at your county elections office or polling location after the voter registration deadline, up to and including Election Day.

It’s a chance we must seize, regardless of party affiliation – our democracy, our community, our lives depend on it.

Rick L. Callender, Esq. is the President of the California/Hawaii State Conference of the NAACP and serves as a member of the National NAACP board of directors.

Isabelle Price

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Activism

Oakland Post: Week of April 17 – 23, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 17 – 23, 2024

Published

5 days ago

April 19, 2024

Oakland Post

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

Oakland Post

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Commentary

Opinion: Surviving the Earthquake, an Eclipse and “Emil Amok.”

Last Friday, a 4.8 magnitude earthquake shook New York City, reported as the “biggest earthquake with an epicenter in the NYC area since 1884” when a 5.2 quake hit. A bit bigger. The last quake similar to Friday’s was a 4.9 in 1783.Alexander Hamilton felt it — 241 years ago. That’s why New Yorkers were freaking out on Friday. They were in the room where it happens.

Published

7 days ago

April 17, 2024

Oakland Post

In New York City, the eclipse was about 90 percent visible. Good enough for me. Though a full solar eclipse is a celestial rarity, blockages of any sort aren’t generally celebrated. My one-man play is about growing up with the eclipsed history of American Filipinos and how I struggle to unblock all that.

By Emil Guillermo

I’m a Northern Californian in New York City for the next few weeks, doing my one-man show, “Emil Amok, Lost NPR Host, Wiley Filipino, Vegan Transdad.”

I must like performing in the wake of Mother Nature.

Alexander Hamilton felt it — 241 years ago.

That’s why New Yorkers were freaking out on Friday. They were in the room where it happens.

And it just doesn’t happen that often.

Beyonce singing country music happens more frequently.

When I felt New York shake last week, it reminded me of a time in a San Francisco TV newsroom when editors fretted about a lack of news an hour before showtime.

Then the office carpeting moved for a good ten seconds, and the news gods gave us our lead story.

On Friday when it happened in NYC, I noticed the lines in the carpeting in my room wiggling. But I thought it was from a raucous hotel worker vacuuming nearby.

I didn’t even think earthquake. In New York?

I just went about my business as if nothing had happened. After living near fault lines all my life, I was taking things for granted.

Considering the age of structures in New York, I should have been even more concerned about falling objects inside (shelves, stuff on walls) and outside buildings (signs, scaffolding), fire hazards from possible gas leaks, and then I should have looked for others on my floor and in the hotel lobby to confirm or aid or tell stories.

Of course, as a Californian who has lived through and covered quakes in the 4 to 6 magnitude range, I tried to calm down any traumatized New Yorker I encountered by taking full responsibility for bringing in the quake from the Bay Area.

I reassured them things would be all right, and then let them know that 4.8s are nothing.

And then I invited them to my consoling post-Earthquake performance of “Emil Amok, Lost NPR Host…”

It was the night of the eclipse.

ECLIPSING THE ECLIPSE

For example, did you know the first Filipinos actually arrived to what is now California in 1587? That’s 33 years before the Pilgrims arrived in America on the other coast, but few know the Filipino history which has been totally eclipsed.

I was in Battery Park sitting on a bench and there was a sense of community as people all came to look up. A young woman sitting next to me had a filter for a cell phone camera. We began talking and she let me use it. That filter enabled me to take a picture of the main event with my iPhone.

For helping me see, I invited her and her boyfriend to come see my show.

Coincidentally, she was from Plymouth, Massachusetts, near the rock that says the year the Pilgrims landed in 1620.

In my show she learned the truth. The Pilgrims were second.

History unblocked. But it took a solar eclipse.

Next one in 2044? We have a lot more unblocking to do.

If you’re in New York come see my show, Sat. April 13th, 5:20 pm Eastern; Fri. April 19, 8:10 pm Eastern; and Sun. April 21st 5:20 pm Eastern.

You can also livestream the show. Get tickets at www.amok.com/tickets

About the Author

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. He does a mini-talk show on YouTube.com/@emilamok1. He wishes all his readers a Happy Easter!

Oakland Post

Posts by Oakland Post

Commentary

Commentary: Republican Votes Are Threatening American Democracy

In many ways, it was great that the Iowa Caucuses were on the same day as Martin Luther King Jr. Day. We needed to know the blunt truth. The takeaway message after the Iowa Caucuses where Donald Trump finished more than 30 points in front of Florida Gov. De Santis and former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley boils down to this: Our democracy is threatened, for real.

Published

1 week ago

April 16, 2024

Oakland Post

It was strange for Iowans to caucus on MLK day. It had a self-cancelling effect. The day that honored America’s civil rights and anti-discrimination hero was negated by evening. That’s when one of the least diverse states in the nation let the world know that white Americans absolutely love Donald Trump. No ifs, ands or buts.

By Emil Guillermo

In many ways, it was great that the Iowa Caucuses were on the same day as Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

We needed to know the blunt truth.

The takeaway message after the Iowa Caucuses where Donald Trump finished more than 30 points in front of Florida Gov. De Santis and former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley boils down to this: Our democracy is threatened, for real.

And to save it will require all hands on deck.

It was strange for Iowans to caucus on MLK day. It had a self-cancelling effect. The day that honored America’s civil rights and anti-discrimination hero was negated by evening.

That’s when one of the least diverse states in the nation let the world know that white Americans absolutely love Donald Trump. No ifs, ands or buts.

No man is above the law? To the majority of his supporters, it seems Trump is.

It’s an anti-democracy loyalty that has spread like a political virus.

No matter what he does, Trump’s their guy. Trump received 51% of caucus-goers votes to beat Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who garnered 21.2%, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who got 19.1%.

The Asian flash in the pan Vivek Ramaswamy finished way behind and dropped out. Perhaps to get in the VP line. Don’t count on it.

According to CNN’s entrance polls, when caucus-goers were asked if they were a part of the “MAGA movement,” nearly half — 46% — said yes. More revealing: “Do you think Biden legitimately won in 2020?”

Only 29% said “yes.”

That means an overwhelming 66% said “no,” thus showing the deep roots in Iowa of the “Big Lie,” the belief in a falsehood that Trump was a victim of election theft.

Even more revealing and posing a direct threat to our democracy was the question of whether Trump was fit for the presidency, even if convicted of a crime.

Sixty-five percent said “yes.”

Who says that about anyone of color indicted on 91 criminal felony counts?

Would a BIPOC executive found liable for business fraud in civil court be given a pass?

How about a BIPOC person found liable for sexual assault?

Iowans have debased the phrase, “no man is above the law.” It’s a mindset that would vote in an American dictatorship.

Compare Iowa with voters in Asia last weekend. Taiwan rejected threats from authoritarian Beijing and elected pro-democracy Taiwanese vice president Lai Ching-te as its new president.

Meanwhile, in our country, which supposedly knows a thing or two about democracy, the Iowa caucuses show how Americans feel about authoritarianism.

Some Americans actually like it even more than the Constitution allows.

About the Author

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. He does a mini-talk show on YouTube.com/@emilamok1.